London-based British-born Chinese female, enjoys arts and culture joy riding, hitch hiking on the web and jumping on and off bandwagons.

Thursday, November 07, 2002

STILL GOING STRONG

Since I've made such a big fuss about the film, and will continue to do so until it gets very very very boring, I will endeavour to actually discuss the film rather than the fact that I have seen it. So...

It was a lot less pretty than the first one. There were fewer lingering shots of the honeycoloured sandstone buildings, lovingly assembled feasts in hall, Harry looking meaningful by leaded windows and more scenes in murky bathrooms, menacing forest and underground tunnels. The sequence with the spiders was truly horrifying; think of the goblin sequence in the Mines of Moria in LotR and add in the unpleasant scuttling of arachnids. Mmmm...arachnids...

The Quidditch was amazing - it looked feckin' dangerous and bloody painful too, as did all the action scenes. When these kids got hurt, it looked like it really hurt. And the humour was a bit more sophisticated than the first film - Seamus' wand did not blow up in his face once, and Branagh did a pretty good job of Lockhart, playing him as less comic relief than a character whose vanity was making him actually quite dangerous to the people around him. Dobby was lame and could have been 1) funnier 2) less like a walking turd with a funny voice 3) better explained since house-elves make more appearances in the next books and he was basically a rubbery looking CGI plot-propeller for the kids impatient to get to the action bits.

And all their voices have broken! Oh My God! ::is very confused by the odd emotions this invokes, especially recalling the way they all looked in Quidditch gear:: Ahem. I do believe that I have to see the film again to give a much more in-depth review. Especially the bit with Tom Riddle striding about looking very pretty in a schoolboy way, explaining all his dastardly plans to a stricken Harry a la every baddie in a Bond film.